


Home at Last

by pebbles1971



Series: Pandemic [3]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Covid-19 pandemic, M/M, Pandemics, Reunion Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:14:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24336442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pebbles1971/pseuds/pebbles1971
Summary: John and Rodney get reacquainted after their long separation
Relationships: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
Series: Pandemic [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1740868
Comments: 8
Kudos: 57





	Home at Last

**Author's Note:**

> This was just an excuse to write something really mushy and smutty. Not much plot to speak of.
> 
> Content note: Covid-19 recovery, historic major burn injury, scarring.

Finally, John was being released from the infirmary, four days after he'd returned through the gate after his long quarantine.

Rodney would never forget the first sight of him, waiting on the other side of the gate as Rodney, Teyla, Ronon and Carson gated through to his quarantine planet to help break the camp and rig the gate to dial Pegasus.

Rodney had seen the indomitable General John Shepherd go through unimaginable things and never break, at least Rodney had _thought_ John hadn't broken, although looking back he wondered if it had just been well hidden.

But the man who they met on P58-472 was _frail_ , that was the only word for it – not just physically, he was overwhelmed and barely hiding his tearfulness as they all greeted him with long hugs. Rodney had known it would be hard for John to be around people again, hence it was his friends who came to greet him, Teyla even taking time out from her demanding role as Governor of Atlantis. John had refused Carson’s gurney. He would come home under his own steam, but it seemed, looking at him, that there was very little steam left.

Every scrap of Rodney’s bluster and bravado just evaporated on contact. He found himself uncharacteristically lacking the ability to even say the wrong thing, let alone the right.

John had barely said a word while they unpacked the camp and Rodney connected up the ZPM. He’d worked alongside everyone else despite his obvious fatigue. Then he had lurched back through the gate on his crutches and on to the infirmary with a haphazard haste that suggested his muscles really weren’t doing what he wanted them to. Once he was in the infirmary, Rodney took his hand, and John clung to it hard, his breathing laboured and wheezy. Rodney had just held on, fighting back his own tears and not knowing what to say.

They’d got through the last year with a combination of flirting and insults, but suddenly Rodney felt solemn and careful and tongue-tied.

The following four days had been an endless round of shrinks, nurses, scans and IVs. The shrinks had encouraged Rodney to stay close to hand, but he hadn't felt like there'd been any real privacy with John, and as the time dragged out, Rodney felt increasingly shy and uncertain.

He had longed for John Shepherd for so long and now he had the man right here he didn't know what to do with him. John was so fragile Rodney was afraid of breaking him. His usual weapons – teasing and snark – had evaporated after just one look at the worn-out, ground down retired General (John kept digging him about calling him General - the appointment had been brief, and politically motivated, designed to lure him away from Atlantis and scupper any chances of him helping Atlantis secede. John had been lured back to Earth as planned, but there used his clout as the man who’d saved Earth twice to grease the wheels of Atlantis’ secession. Then he’d medically retired by simply being honest about the state of his health and come home to a free Atlantis. Still, Rodney liked to call him General, because political or not, the promotion had been richly deserved for the way this hapless flyboy had taken the leadership mantle that landed on his shoulders and grown with it.)

The uncertainty about how he should be with John was only more acute now John was being released from the infirmary. He was still in lousy physical condition brought about by the after effects of Covid-19 and more than a little self-neglect, partly due to his injuries from his climbing fall ('I keep telling you it was a scramble not a climb!') and partly due to the fact John had never been particularly good at remembering to eat, something that only got worse when he was stressed. The shrinks thought the stress of isolation had hit him hard too. John wasn’t the most sociable person in the world, but six months completely alone was a lot for any human to bear.

There had been enough of an improvement for him to go home and rest, and that's where things got complicated. Rodney's intense desire to fuck John into next month, as described in his emails, had not exactly changed, it just seemed massively inappropriate to want to jump the bones of someone who was barely holding himself up.

On the other hand, backing off now while John healed could be sending all the wrong messages, and Rodney really didn’t know how to be subtle about what was going on his head so he could get some sort of cue.

He flashed back to the time five years previously, when he'd had similar feelings as John recovered from being caught in the explosion aboard yet another hive ship that was on route to launch an attack on Earth. In an astonishing case of déjà vu, John had found himself once again riding a nuke into a wraith hive. He had, of course, saved the day again. But the mission had been a catalogue of failures, starting with a nuke that wouldn’t detonate and ending with John being cut off from his modified dart when the C4 he’d placed instead went off. Rodney had not been prepared to lose him and had miraculously managed to beam John out of the middle of the inferno at the moment the hive shields failed due to the explosion ripping apart the ship.

Rodney remembered the emails they'd exchanged when John had been on earth. The ones that had finally got them talking about why the sort-of relationship they’d had before the accident had faltered.

 _So it wasn't the burns?_ John had asked.

Rodney had been shocked when he read that. How could John have thought . . . Rodney had wanted John just as much, if not more (there’s nothing like nearly losing someone to realise how in-too-deep in love with them you are) but John was so hurt, his body so scarred, and Rodney had been afraid – not put off by John's changed body, just frightened of getting things wrong. Of causing more harm. And then there was the way the more Rodney tried to take care of John, the more he got pushed away. Much later, when John had initiated what seemed like a casual hook-up, Rodney had been hurt, thinking that was all he meant to John. They’d fucked, but then Rodney had backed off a long way, and they hadn’t been together since. Looking back, he could see the other side – how his actions may have come across to John as uninterested, his insecurities read as rejection.

He needed to not make that mistake again.

Well, one thing that could be said for Rodney McKay was that he knew how to take the direct approach. John was sitting on the edge of his bed, waiting for Carson to bring some meds and discharge him. Rodney sat next to him, and took his hand.

It was an indescribable feeling being able to touch John after so long apart. Just holding his hand had the power to make Rodney's breathing go a little funny, as clichéd as that might have been. It felt like electricity tingling in his fingers, and he couldn't help but lift the other man's hand to his lips and press them into the back of John's hand. Then, he blurted:

'So, this is probably massively inappropriate given how unwell you are, but I'd still like to take you home and fuck you into next month. And if you're not ready for that, it's fine. But I thought it was important to say, just in case all my worrying about you has obscured the fact that my deep and abiding desire for you hasn’t changed.'

John looked at him, startled. His eyes widened, and Rodney felt a surge of something inside him as he watched a light seem to come on in John. John tugged gently but firmly on Rodney’s hand, and then without any more preamble, dove in for a kiss.

Rodney was taken aback for a second by the power behind that kiss. If he had thought John weak and frail, he was surprised to find the man could still be fiercely passionate. Within seconds, John was carefully biting down on Rodney’s lower lip and then licking his way into Rodney’s mouth, while one hand pressed firmly into the small of Rodney’s back and the other found its way inside his T-shirt. It only took moments for Rodney to kiss John back with equal passion, his hand coming up to John’s neck and sliding up into his hair. John sighed into his mouth at this, and shivered with pleasure at his touch.

John’s hand slid up Rodney’s side, under his clothes, and found its way to his left nipple, pinching it just hard enough to send a signal straight to his dick. At this rate, they weren’t going to make it home before Rodney had an embarrassing incident.

‘Ahem.’ A voice came from the doorway, and John and Rodney broke apart like a couple of teenagers caught on their parents’ couch. ‘Not that ye don’t deserve a bit of happiness, but if ye can just wait ten more minutes, I’ll discharge ye so ye can get a wee bit more privacy.’

John grinned at Carson, and Rodney’s heart skipped. It was the first time he’d seen that smile since John had been home. ‘Sorry, doc.’ John said sheepishly, sliding his hand back into Rodney’s as he said it.

It was less than ten minutes before they were leaving the infirmary and taking the transporter back to John’s apartment. The General had finally got a bigger place with a bigger bed back during their sojourn on Earth. It was also just down the hall from Rodney’s place, which Rodney had taken on after he broke up with Jennifer. John was still using crutches, although the Ancient bone-knitting device had substantially improved his badly mended ankle. When they got into his place, he looked suddenly tired again, and Rodney wondered if he was being optimistic to imagine dragging John to bed and doing all the things he had promised to do. Well, John was home now. There was no rush.

John sank down onto the couch, wheezing heavily. The virus had really done for John’s already wrecked lungs. They would never be the same after the explosion. Without the Goa’uld healing device and the combined medical knowledge of several planets, John would have died back then. Now, his face and body still bore the scars, but he was still John, still beautiful to Rodney despite the loss of some of his classic prettiness.

‘Maybe I should let you rest?’ Rodney asked, fetching John a drink of water and then sitting on the coffee table opposite him, knee to knee, surveying him anxiously.

‘Don’t you fucking dare go,’ John said fiercely, holding on to Rodney’s hand with a ferocious grip. ‘Just gimme a minute to catch my breath, huh?’

‘Hey, why don’t you take a bath?’ Rodney said. ‘The steam may ease things a bit, and, well . . .’

John quirked one eyebrow at Rodney questioningly.

‘I’d quite like to have you all relaxed and pliant for what I have in mind . . .’ Rodney finished shyly.

‘God, Rodney. Yeah, I’d like that.’

‘Stay there, then, and I’ll draw it.’

***

This was bliss. John hadn’t had a bath in the longest time. During his quarantine, he’d had a pathetic solar shower. Which, truth be told, he was often too exhausted to use. The post-viral fatigue was a fucking bitch. The whole struggling to breathe thing didn’t help, though he was sort of used to his shit, burn-scarred lungs by now.

Now, he was luxuriating in the deep, hot water while Rodney perched on the side of the bath and massaged shampoo into his hair until he became almost boneless.

He couldn’t quite believe he was finally here. He’d missed Rodney’s touch for five long years, so sure that his burn scars left him completely undesirable, and so sure Rodney saw their relationship as nothing more than friends-with-benefits. Not that he hadn’t been supremely grateful to have been saved, to have been given back his life, and over time even had his face more or less restored by alien technology. Scarred, sure, but still recognisable as John Shepherd. His flight suit’s helmet and gloves had saved his hands and hair, but his chest had taken the brunt of the blast, and now his upper torso was still a mess of hairless scar tissue. A Satedan technique for permanent hair removal had evened out the rest of his torso so that he no longer had uneven patches of hair left in the un-scarred places. Still, he didn’t much like looking at his body.

But Rodney didn’t seem to mind the scars at all, and John was pathetically grateful to finally let himself be seen.

Rodney rinsed off his hair and then trailed a hand down John’s front. As if he was reading John’s mind, he said, ‘you’re beautiful to me, John. Always have been, always will be. I’m sorry I left you thinking anything else. I was an insecure fool.’

‘And I was doing my damnedest to push you away,’ John acknowledged. He was so crap at needing things. Needing people. Back then, God, he’d been just a big, raw bundle of need. It was too much and he just shut down.

‘I wish we’d been better at talking,’ Rodney said.

‘That’s not us,’ John replied. Although now he came to think of it, the two of them seemed to have abandoned their usual sniping at each other and be almost communicating like normal humans since he got back. Maybe there was hope for them?

‘No,’ Rodney acknowledged. And then he was kissing John, slow and intense, and it made John feel like crying, but in a good way.

‘Let’s get you out and dried,’ Rodney said eventually. He helped John out of the bath and sat him on the edge, drying him off with care. John had been alone for so long that all this attention was almost excruciating, but at the same time blissful. When he was done, Rodney leaned in to trail kisses down John’s neck and collarbone, and this set off sparks inside of John.

‘Bed?’ Rodney asked, sounding hopeful.

‘Yeah,’ John replied, hoping the intense desire that was pooling in his gut came through in his tone.

They climbed naked into John’s bed, which had been made ready with fresh, clean sheets before he arrived. The clean cotton smell and the crispness of them felt good after the smell of the infirmary and months of sleeping bag scuzziness.

‘So, I’m at your service. Whatever you want, John, it’s yours.’

That simple sentence filled John with both fear and arousal. Asking for what he needed was a tall order, but the want he felt right now was off the scale. It was deep, so much more than simply sex, it was a heady combination of having missed his lover for five long years, having been alone for six excruciating months, on top of the simple fact that he had been in love and lust with this man since the day he walked into the middle of an energy cloud and saved the expedition.

‘Fuck me?’ John asked, feeling his skin heat. ‘Real slow, if you can manage it.’

‘Mmm, I think there’s only one way I’m going to achieve that, actually.’ Rodney responded, ‘but that’s okay, as long as you’re prepared to be patient and wait for the main event . . .’

‘Got all the time in the world for you McKay,’ John responded.

Rodney didn’t reply, he just straddled John’s hips and gave him a long and dirty kiss, while letting their cocks just brush against each other maddeningly. Then he sank down, grinding into John with intent.

‘I’m so close to the edge, it’s embarrassing,’ Rodney admitted, his blue eyes looking down at John intently. ‘So, can I blow you before I fuck you?’

John’s back involuntarily arched upward towards his lover at these words. ‘Fuck, yeah,’ he said.

Rodney gave John another long, deep kiss and then crawled down his body, dropping kisses down his scarred torso as he went. The scar tissue created interesting sensations – in some places it was inert, in others hypersensitive. John hadn’t been with anyone since the explosion, other than that one quick fuck from behind on a dark pier when he and Rodney had hooked up, not that long before he got promoted and shipped to Earth.

Letting Rodney touch his scars and opening himself to the possibility someone could want to _make love_ to him was something new. It had him squirming with pleasure to have his broken body shown such love and care. To derive pleasure even from his scars? That was unexpected.

Rodney was getting lower now, moving to the place where his scars ended and the remnants of John’s happy trail began. John’s cock lay against his abdomen, heavy and leaking. Rodney ignored it, instead pressing kisses into the crease of his thighs on either side, and then pushing John’s legs apart and brushing his fingertips across John’s perineum. John writhed from Rodney’s touch, and Rodney used his other hand to press John firmly down into the mattress.

Then, finally he stopped teasing and traced the tip of his tongue from root to tip of John’s cock. John moaned, shamelessly. This really wasn’t going to take long, the way he was feeling. Rodney’s mouth had always been one of his favourite things in the universe, whatever it was doing. Whether it was demonstrating his brilliance, blasting people with arrogance and snark, or doing dirty things to John’s body.

Right now, Rodney’s lips were slowly wrapping themselves around the head of John’s cock and sucking gently, while his hands at John’s hips pushed him down into the mattress. Rodney’s tongue flicked away at the frenulum, and nerves fired throughout John’s body, leaving him awash with sensation. It was almost too much.

Rodney’s mouth was as agile as it had always been, that clever tongue knowing exactly which buttons to press. John was quickly panting, right on the edge. ‘Close, so close,’ he moaned, pushing into the resistance of the hands holding him down.

Rodney didn’t let up – he just increased the suction, pushing John higher, and then taking one hand from John’s hip and tracing down his perineum, caressing John’s hole with his thumb and then gently pressing in.

 _Fuck!_ John came so hard it was like being pulled under by a riptide. He uttered a small cry as Rodney continued to suck him through the after-shocks, gently teasing that thumb into his hole in promise of what was to come. John began to float away on the sensations happening all the way through him. It had been a long, long time since his body had felt good.

As he started to regain awareness, he realised Rodney was shifting himself to grind against John’s leg.

‘Get up here and fuck my face,’ John demanded. He may have been too weak for a more active role, but that didn’t mean he was gonna let Rodney just rub off on him. Rodney’s eyes widened, but he didn’t have to be asked twice. He slid back up John’s body, giving him a sloppy kiss that tasted of come, and then straddling John’s shoulders. Grabbing the headboard with one hand and his dick with the other, Rodney slid himself forward and fed his cock into John’s hungry mouth.

God, John had missed the taste of him so much. He could tell Rodney was right on the edge, leaking pre-come and sighing as he thrust into John’s mouth with small but purposeful movements. John felt so much peace in that moment. Having Rodney inside of him was another level of homecoming. He felt claimed in a way that was an antidote to the adriftness he’d felt for five long years.

‘Oh god, I’m going to come!’ Rodney said after hardly any time at all, and that was all the warning John got as Rodney’s seed flooded his mouth and he swallowed enthusiastically, milking Rodney through his orgasm. ‘So good, John, so, so good,’ Rodney burbled as his hips trembled with ebbing pleasure.

Eventually, the aftershocks subsided and Rodney went to move, but John brought both his hands up to Rodney’s buttocks and held him in place. He gentled his ministrations on Rodney’s now-sensitive cock, but he did not stop sucking and teasing with his tongue. If there was one thing he remembered about this man it was how easy it was to get him going again. After a minute or so of going easy, he began to make his movements more purposeful, flicking the head of Rodney’s cock with his tongue, and increasing the suction.

He began to massage Rodney’s perfect ass with both hands, pulling him in harder. Sure enough, the cock in his mouth began to stir and harden again. John finally pulled off, with a grin. ‘Now you can fuck me,’ he said.

‘With pleasure,’ Rodney replied with a grin of his own.

There was a brand-new pot of the lube that came from New Seteda on the bedside table. Rodney reached for it, removing the lid and dropping it on the bed next to John’s hip.

‘How do you want to do this?’ Rodney asked, and John just rolled over in response, stretching the length of his unscarred back and pillowing his head on his arms.

***

The long line of John’s back and his small but perfect ass came into Rodney’s view and Rodney’s dick hardened the rest of the way at the sight. Now the urgency of his initial desire had been sated, he was prepared to take his time and really take John apart piece by little piece. Starting at John’s neck, he nibbled little, biting kisses into John’s hairline and then slowly began to work his way down John’s spine, massaging John’s shoulders and back as he went. He felt another loosening in the man beneath him, and it almost hurt him to think just how much this body had been carrying, and for so long.

His lips reached the small of John’s back, and he massaged John’s ass and then began to prise apart those cheeks to reveal the pucker beneath. His tongue traced the clean line of John’s crack, and then flicked gently at his hole, eliciting a moan of pleasure and a gentle squirm. He flicked again, and John pushed back a little onto Rodney’s tongue. That was more than enough invitation for Rodney to press his tongue a little harder, causing John to moan louder.

John hadn’t been like this, before. He’d been the silent type, never really giving away what he was feeling, except through the slightest of clues. Rodney liked this John better – he was beginning to see that the frailty, the vulnerability of the man was not all bad. John was raw and needy, and those were not necessarily negative things. He was present in a way he never had been before.

Rodney pressed his tongue further inside John, making it tremble right into the core of his lover.

‘Fuck! Rodney, so good . . .’ As Rodney opened John up with his tongue, John began to press his body into the mattress, and when Rodney reached under him, grasping John’s cock, he found the man was once again hard and leaking. He fucked his tongue into John some more, and then reached for the lube, getting his fingers good and slick, and sliding them inside John one at a time, slowly massaging his insides, taking his time and only gently teasing at John’s prostate.

When the third finger was in, he began to massage John’s sweet spot with more intent, and John cried out and bucked back onto Rodney’s fingers.

‘Please, Rodney.’

Please what, John?’

‘Fuck me. Please fuck me,’ John responded, breathless and wanton.

Rodney’s own breath was taken away by this. He couldn’t think of many times John Sheppard had asked for what he wanted, let alone begged. The way he was responding to Rodney now was arousing almost to the point of pain. Rodney’s cock felt tight and desperate, and his need to be inside John was all consuming. He pulled his fingers out of John and John whined. But Rodney just wiped his hand on a towel, and turned John over, arranging a pillow under his ass and pushing the leg that didn’t have a broken ankle into a bent position against John’s chest.

‘I’m prettier the other way round,’ John said, a cloud passing across his face.

Rodney took a long, honest look at John’s scarred body. He couldn’t pretend that it wasn’t painful to see the damage and be reminded of nearly losing John, but at the same time the scars also reminded him of the miracle of John’s survival. And John was still John, the person Rodney had always desired more than anyone else he’d ever met.

‘You’re beautiful this way round,’ Rodney said honestly, as he lubed up his cock and slowly sank into John’s body. The bath and the blowjob had made John pliant, and despite how long it had been, his body was completely receptive to Rodney, opening up beneath him almost seamlessly. Rodney felt welcomed and wanted as he slid the last of the way home and bent down to kiss John, slow and intense, his tongue playing with John’s.

For a while, he didn’t want to move. He just wanted to be there, right inside of John, pressed tightly against each other. John’s arms came up and held him tight around the shoulders, as if he felt the same. Slowly, though, they both began to move against each other, a gentle slide and squirm. This progressed to little thrusts that moved against John’s prostate and had him sighing. John slid his hands down Rodney’s back and sank his fingers into Rodney’s ass, pulling him in even closer. His ass had always been one of John’s favourite things, and five years apparently hadn’t changed that.

They did not stop kissing, although as their arousal grew it became more breathing into each other’s mouths and making little gasps as their bodies shoved against one another as if trying to merge completely.

John’s moans were almost constant now, and Rodney’s were matching them. He was completely undone by the way John was letting go, something he had never seen; it felt such privilege to witness.

‘Oh God, Rodney!’

Rodney pulled back a little and looked at John’s face and it was as undone as Rodney felt. Maybe they couldn’t say the things that really mattered, like _I love you_ without an added helping of snark and sniping, but the feelings were written all over John’s face. Suddenly, Rodney felt desperate. It was all too much and not enough. His hips pulled back and slammed inside John and they both cried out. He did it again and again, desperate to see the face beneath him break with pleasure.

‘Yes!’ John said as Rodney changed the angle slightly and thrust home hard into John’s heat. And then there was a litany of almost nonsensical words and cries as he pushed John higher and higher towards his peak, while chasing his own. His hips sped up, slamming himself into John, desperate to hear more of those pleasure-soaked words, _please_ and _yes_ and finally _I love you_.

And Rodney was saying it too, over and over as he emptied himself inside John’s body. John came hard and untouched onto his belly, the contracting muscles of his ass milking the last of Rodney’s pleasure.

Rodney leaned back down to kiss John long and slow, his heart so full he didn’t know what to do with it. Having John here was amazing, having John here and being so open and vulnerable was something he never thought he’d see.

‘Missed you so damn much,’ John said, and Rodney knew he didn’t just mean through the lockdown and the quarantine but the stupid, pointless years they’d been apart before that. The temptation to say something snarky, to bring his defences a little way back up, was strong, but Rodney resisted.

‘Missed you for five fucking years, you idiot. It was always you. It always will be you. I’m not fucking letting you go again, ever. Understood?’

John just snuggled close and hummed contentedly.

***

When John woke, he could barely breathe for the weight pressing on his chest. He panicked. Was the fucking virus coming round for another round of ‘let’s see if we can make the human stop breathing’? He would never forget the feeling of fighting for his breath and losing. Or that there hadn’t been enough ventilators for everyone and he would have died without one.

Before the panic set in, and before he even hit full consciousness, John remembered the exercises he’d been given and took a long breath out before letting his lungs slowly fill.

It was surprisingly easy. Now that he was more awake, he was able to process the fact that the weight on his chest was not from his clapped-out lungs but from a snoozing, drooling astrophysicist. A flood of relief and something bright and happy suffused him. Actually, once he’d contextualised what was happening to his body and shaken off sleep, he decided he liked the sense of being pinned down. He was way too weak to move his lover but he didn’t care. He felt safe here. He was home


End file.
